“One day as a 16 year old; while at home with a friend that I had known my whole life from church, I was told by him some things regarding a close friend of ours. This friend of ours had also attended church with us in our childhood and went down a similar path into the depths of sin. We all walked this path of sin together.

 “I was told how that through the power of a living God, our friend had been completely delivered and life supernaturally changed completely.

 “As I was listening to the testimony of this man, immediately the pricks of conviction began picking at my heart. Religion and tradition had no desire in my mind but a LIVING GOD who really changes lives was certainly a desire of mine.

 “From that moment, at home on my balcony, I felt the pulling and call of repentance knocking at the door of my heart.

 “Being taught in my youth, I knew what I was experiencing was the conviction of the Holy Spirit. It was the Lord Jesus knocking at my heart trying to gain entrance, trying to get me to surrender my life of Sin and walk in a life free of Sin.

 “If God can do it for that man, Surely God could do it for me.” These were the words echoing through the corridors of my heart that night as I was resisting and trying my very best to hush that holy call.

 “Eventually, through the great mercies of God, that night alone in my bedroom, I knelt over my bed in answer to the beckoning of the Holy Spirit. I cried unto the Lord and repented of all my sins and accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as my personal Saviour.

 “Rising up from prayer, I felt as though in my room the abundance of prayers that had been spoken over me through the years had just been answered.

 “I went to my knees as a poor sinner boy with no hope or direction for my life, and came up from my knees completely changed on the inside. In a moment my desire for immorality, drugs, cigarettes, alcohol, and riotous living had been wiped out. I had been set free from anxiety, fears, nervousness, and pride. I began to hunger for God, righteousness, and to line up with The Bible and to
please God.

 “And now, 9 years later, as a 25-year-old, the testimony of Jesus Christ remains the same. I have never gone back to any of those things I once desired, nor have I been bound by the fears and anxieties that once tormented me.

 “My testimony can be watched in more detail on YouTube: John Waldner Testimony Pt 1”

Destructive Desires Instantly Changed

Karim Sharipov

Hi my name is Karim and I just want to tell you a little bit of what the Lord has done for me. He is still working and molding me day by day.  This will be about how the Lord changed the direction of my life, and it’s only by His mercy and His grace that I am here.

It’s hard finding where I should start off with this, because looking back now there was a certain place that God had to get me to before I would change. Unfortunately some of us can be very stubborn and want it our own way but if we would just humble ourselves and surrender ourselves to God then we would see God do amazing things in our lives. 

My whole life I have been surrounded by Christians. My dad was Muslim that the Lord converted to a Christian and my mom was a Russian Pentecostal. They both did their best to raise me the right way. I know they weren’t perfect but I know that they raised me with love. They worked hard to send myself and my sisters to a private Christian school for the first 6 grades, but after that I went to public school. That’s when I started to wander onto the wrong path. Most of the kids I went to school with weren’t Christians and as a young kid that had no friends, I wanted to fit in. Most of the kids would swear, listen to bad music, make bad jokes and those things wore on me. I remember that it wasn’t until the 10th grade that I said my first swear word and all my friends were shocked when they heard it. At that point I wasn’t exactly living the way the Lord wanted me to anyway and the burden of sticking out was too heavy and I broke. Over the next few years I let the negative influence take over my life. I started drinking, smoking weed, and everything else that the world was putting in my face. At first I thought it was fun rebelling a little bit, and for the most part I did believe I was having fun. Still there was something in the back of my head telling me that I was doing wrong but I never listened to that voice. 

I kept going farther and farther down the wrong path. I eventually graduated and moved away from my friends because I wanted to get away from the negative influence, but that didn’t help. At that point I was living for Satan and thought that I only wanted to serve the Lord because that’s how I was raised. I moved from place to place all the while trying to fix my life. I wanted to be successful and have a family and I wanted to serve the Lord but there were certain things that I couldn’t let go of. Weed, video games, porn, nicotine and more. I remember crying some nights and praying that God would help me. 

There is a saying that is very true, “Sin will take you farther than you ever wanted to go and it will keep you longer than you wanted to stay.” 

That’s what happened to me. I thought I could dabble in the world and have a little bit of “fun” and then go back to God and go to heaven, not realizing what a big mistake that was. I got very depressed and full of anxiety. I didn’t think that I was ever going to make it out. I tried all the self help books: meditation, gratitude, affirmations, journaling, anything and everything that I could find but nothing ever helped. 

Then one day everything changed. I had some sort of mental break and went into what I think was psychosis. I’m not 100% sure to this day. For two weeks I walked around not thinking anything was real, my fiancé, family, friends… God. I was in that mental state for two weeks and it was the most hopeless feeling–I couldn’t find a reason to live. But then one day while I was at work my dad sent me an ebook on a man named William Branham and how God turned his life around. A few minutes into the book a voice spoke to me and told me that everything the devil was telling me was a lie. All at once something hit me like a lightning bolt from heaven. All the burdens, depression, anxiety, addictions went away! I can’t explain it to this day. I was doing some yard work at the time and I couldn’t stop crying. I went home that day a free man. 

This was all happening a week or two before my wedding. I almost didn’t think it was going to happen; I thought I was going to run away. The Lord changed all of that in an instant. From that day on I didn’t have a single desire for weed, porn, bad music, bad talking and more. I couldn’t stop feeding on God’s Word. It’s like I had starved myself for years, and now I was making up for it. I would read the Bible, listen to sermons, pray, worship, go to church as much as I could. That’s all I want to do even to this day. It was all Him, none of it was me. He saved me and absolutely turned my and my family’s life around. The only thing the devil can do is lie and pervert. He has deceived so many people. All I want to do is be a tool in God’s hands to make people realize what a liar the devil is.

By God’s mercy and grace he saved me even when I didn't deserve it. He got me to a place where I realized that nothing in this world will ever satisfy only Him. I just hope and pray that when I come into contact with other people that they see Him living through me and that they would take my life as an example of what not to do. I just  want to do anything and everything that I can for His kingdom.

Karim Sheripov now manages thegodwhoanswersback.org web site.  He is happily married, and has a beautiful young daughter.